NEW YORK - Both Ashley Rinere and Jessie Ambrose knocked in four goals on Sunday, Feb. 23 as the Columbia women's lacrosse team rolled LIU Brooklyn in their home opener, 20-11. With the score tied at 8-8 at the break, the Lions used an offensive explosion in the second half to outscore the Blackbirds 12-3 for the win. Columbia had seven different players score, including five with three or more goals on the day.

The first half was a back-and-forth battle with both teams seeming to have an answer after each score. Taylor Quinn posted the opening goal of the season for Lions just two minutes into the game, her first of three for the half. LIU responded a minute later at 27:18 and Columbia doubled-up with scores from Paige Cuscovitch and Ashley Rinere to take a 3-1 lead at 25:16.

The Blackbirds came back with two straight scores of their own to tie the game at 3-3 ten minutes into the game. Margaret Sinzer finished off a nice assist from Sarah Greenberg for her first score and Quinn fired off back-to-back scores to tally a hat trick midway through the half. Rinere scored her second goal of the half at 10:24 and Kate Murphy followed with a score at 6:31 to give the Lions an 8-5 lead. However, with five minutes in the first half, LIU scored three straight goals to tie the game 8-8 at the break.

In the second half, the Lions’ offense went into high gear from the start and never stopped. Murphy scored her second goal of the game to begin the half followed by a score Jessie Ambrose who put together a fantastic half tallying four goals.

With the score at 10-8, LIU responded with a goal from Brittany Rader at 22:51 to trim the Columbia lead to 10-9. From that moment on, the Lions put on an impressive offensive display scoring eight unanswered goals. Rinere tallied a hat trick at 14:48, followed by Sarah Greenberg at 11:08, Ambrose’s second goal at 10:05, another Rinere score at 8:25, a successful free position from Cuscovtcih at 7:11, a hat trick from Ambrose at 6:30 and back-to-back goals from Sinzer to push the lead to 18-9 at 1:57.

In the closing 20 seconds, Murphy hit the back of the net for a goal and Ambrose scored her fourth just before the final horn to give the Lions a 20-11 win at Robert K. Kraft Field.

Columbia will be back in action at home on Saturday, March 1 for the first Ivy League game of the season against Brown at 1 p.m.